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Clamour for state, community police gaining ground in South-South

By elvin Ebiri (South-South Bureau Chief)
29 December 2019   |   3:10 am
Stakeholders in the Niger Delta have canvassed the adoption of a community approach to policing in curbing crimes and criminality,

Delta State Governor Ifeanyi Okowa. Photo: TWITTER/AIOKOWA

Stakeholders in the Niger Delta have canvassed the adoption of a community approach to policing in curbing crimes and criminality, including threats posed by cultism, light weapons proliferation, kidnapping and sea piracy in the area.

According to them, adopting this strategy will be hugely beneficial as it would allow citizens the latitude to work with the Police to secure their neighborhoods.

The call is becoming strident at a time when crime rate spike is glaring in Edo, Delta, Bayelsa, Rivers, Akwa Ibom and Cross River states. Incidentally, there is also political and social consensus that decades of colonial-style coercive, centralised policing, have failed, hence the need to embrace community policing, as an alternative policing strategy to deal with crime prevention, maintenance of order and security of life and property in the oil-rich region.

This yearning to enhance security and tackle crime with greater involvement of the people, necessitated the gathering of top police chiefs, State governors, traditional rulers, and civil society organisations in Asaba, Delta State for the Regional Police Security Summit, with the theme: “Strategic Partnership for Effective Community Policing in the South-South Zone.”

Because there cannot be sustained development without law and order, the Inspector General of Police, Mohammed Adamu, said the efficacy of policing would continue to be of no effect without ensuring community participation.

“There is no police force within any clime in the world that can achieve its mandate in isolation of the community they were established to serve. This is regardless of the number or quality of the human resources, logistics capacity and finding profile, or remuneration and policing strategies that are in place.”

Adamu explained that the security and safety of police personnel would remain under threat if there exist partnership, communication and trust gaps between the police and the citizens.

This was one of the points that underscored the importance of the zonal security summit, where he also reiterated his resolve to maximise the deployment of resources towards mitigating crimes and fears in the country.

“It is this process that we call on you as strategic stakeholders in the South-South to support us in sustaining, strengthening and advancing in the interest of our communal and internal security. In furtherance of this, we shall soon be re-launching the safer highway motorised patrol and the safer city schemes. Some of the acquired police smart surveillance patrol vehicles shall be deployed for the surveillance of oil pipelines along major highways and other vulnerable locations in the country.”

The Governor of Delta State, Senator Ifeanyi Okowa, remarked that the Niger Delta region has had to grapple with multi-faceted forms of insecurity, beginning with the militancy in the creeks, which resulted largely from what the people perceive as years of neglect and non-recognition as an important component of the federation.

Okowa stated that militants at the peak of their activities tasked the capacity of law enforcement agencies, oftentimes exposing the gaps inherent in the country’s security architecture.

He explained that although militancy has significantly abated, the region was still faced with other emerging security challenges. “The zone now faces emerging security challenge that requires fresh challenges; in this wise, adopting the summit theme is imperative in tackling heightened cases of cultism, small arms and light weapons proliferation, farmers/herdsmen clashes, kidnapping, sea piracy and sex trafficking that now dominate the region.”

The governor pointed out that at a time when crime rates are worsening in the region and the police have proven they lack the resources and capacity to tackle security challenges plaguing the country on their own, it behooves stakeholders to have a rethink and allow for community participation in the maintenance of public order and crime reduction.

“Community policing is, essentially, a collaboration between the police and the people, to identify and nip problems in the bud before they escalate into full-blown security challenges. It is a practical approach to improving the process and platform that engenders peacebuilding, preserve our collective security and enhance the credibility of our criminal justice system and delivers better policing service. The most critical component for constructing a strategic and effective partnership for community policing is trust between the police and the people they serve.”

The governor regretted that the relationship between the police and the average citizen has been marred by distrust, suspicion and outright resentment since the police are generally perceived not as a friend, but a conquering force, working at the behest of an oppressive ruling class.

“There is, therefore, the need to breakdown the wall of apathy and rebuild trust through deliberate policies and actions. The second component of a successful partnership is a commitment to problem-solving on the part of all concerned.”

On his part, the Governor of Edo State, Mr. Godwin Obaseki, said the system, practices, and procedures, which the country has been governed in the last 60 to 70 years, is no longer suitable for governance today.

Obaseki, who acknowledged that his state was particularly porous because of its nodal nature, which makes policing a bit challenging, added that that the state has had the unfortunate experience of organised crime, particularly, economic and financial crimes, kidnappings, cultism, and thuggery, which is occasioned by huge youth unemployment, as well as human trafficking and irregular migration.

The governor said the absence of opportunities to cater to the rapidly changing population was largely responsible for the current security difficulties that the country was now grappling with.

He recommended that to deal with policing and crime, the country must first focus on how to expand economic opportunities to young people who are most prone to criminality.

Obaseki stated that presently in Edo State, his administration was dealing with issues that focus on people, particularly education and health. Other initiatives also aimed at addressing the needs of the people, he said, include expanding the economy through huge investment in agriculture, industrialisation, and promotion of entrepreneurship.

He, however, noted with dismay that Nigeria was perhaps one of the few countries in the world that practices federalism and has a unitary policing system, describing the development as a contradiction in itself even as he stressed that Nigerians must collectively resolve to address that contradiction.

The governor said the high rate of insecurity and inability of the police to tackle security challenges effectively, makes the issue of state or community policing not a subject to debate, stressing that what should be the preoccupation of Nigerians at this point ought to be how the state or community police would operate to address the concerns and fears that the people have about their safety.

“It is not whether we should have them. They must exist. They do in some form, but what is important now is how to make or restructure them properly and constitutionally. … We as a state believe that we should have, don’t call it the police, but a security arrangement within the state that covers all the local government areas and reports to the Governor’s Office, while all that information/intelligence that is gathered and funneled into the central command in the Governor’s Office is shared with all federal services and agencies in the state.”

Obaseki said with the size and complexity of the Nigeria Police, as well as the way it is structured today, funding has been a major challenge.

He emphasised that a situation was stated were bearing a huge burden of funding federal agencies and federal services were not sustainable. He, therefore, suggested that the Police should be restructured to utilise funding that is available from the Federal Government more efficiently and effectively, while state governments utilise their funds for their local security architecture.

“Funding the police from federal and state budgets alone may not be adequate. We have to look outside that arrangement. That is why the issue of the Police Security Trust Fund comes into focus, and for us in Edo State, we are also launching our security trust fund to fund that arrangement. In my budget for next year, the state government has committed N2b as its contribution to that trust fund, and by the time we finish working with corporate agencies, individuals in our society, we hope to increase that amount significantly.

The governor said the police must be restructured properly and strategically in a manner that addresses the concerns of everyone.

“We had regional police at one time in this country and we know the crisis that occurred. That may be one of the challenges of the concept of community policing. I believe that with the experience that we had before, we need to address those fears first so that the debate of having state or community police should not be the issue. What should be the issue should be how do we do it; how do we protect the integrity of whatever system that we are putting in place, and by the grace of God, Nigeria with this sort of arrangement will be a better nation.”

Obaseki disclosed that as part of the security infrastructure in Edo State, there currently exists a technology that receives information and reports on occurrence across Benin City and this would soon be expanded to other parts.

The Bayelsa State Governor, Seriake Henry Dickson, who was represented by his Special Adviser on Security, Boma Sporo Jack, said his administration has done a lot in terms of tackling crime and criminality.

Dickson said evidence has shown that community policing, which involves the federal police has proven to be an ineffective strategy for resolving local safety concerns, and improve local crime control.

The governor who was once a police officer, enjoined the people to help the police function effectively as, according to him, for community policing to succeed, the citizens must be the eyes and the ears of the Police.

“To the traditional rulers, if we want community policing to work, we must key into the vision and we must be our watchdogs. The criminals amongst us are not mammy waters; they are not spirits, they are human beings, they have names, and have known addresses, where they reside. Above all, we know them; we know their parents; we know their friends; we know where they live, and we know their evil activities. But what have we done? Community policing is people-based,” he said.

He explained that because Bayelsa State is the hub of the Niger Delta oil and gas industry and has been faced with security challenges occasioned by the activities of multinational oil companies.

According to him, the state has had to manage the contradictions placed on it by the international oil companies, and oil exploration.

“We manage the contradictions while they have taken the oil. Now, we manage people particularly our youths. How do we manage them? We cause them to understand who they are; what they can do; the power in their hands, and how they can use it,” he said.

On his part, the Akwa Ibom State Governor, Emmanuel Udom, who was represented by his Senior Special Assistant on Security, Mr. Fubara Duke, said the importance of community policing cannot be overemphasized, and called on the police to take necessary actions to curb insecurity in his state and other parts of the region.

The Chairman of Rivers State Council of Traditional Rulers and Amayanabo of Opobo, King Douglas Dandeson Jaja, suggested that it was necessary that as leaders, custodians of culture, tradition, and those who understand the sensibilities of their people, traditional rulers should never be discountenanced in community policing.

“If we are embracing community policing, traditional rulers should be given pride of place in the scheme of things; they should even be part of the planning process. Furthermore, policemen who come to our communities should be assisted adequately by traditional rulers so that their work becomes easy.

“So, I want to say that so far in our community, that is Opobo community, we have had a good relationship with the Police, but things are happening in other communities that the Police need to take very seriously. Policemen should be trained and retrained to make sure that their relationship with people in communities where they work is cordial, and the people will trust them. If the people trust the police, they will certainly give them their best and assist them,” he said.

The monarch, who commended Governor Nyesom Wike for establishing the Rivers State Neighbourhood Watch, added that the recently launched security outfit- “Operation Sting,” which he described as heavily funded and well equipped has brought criminality down in the State.

King Jaja recommended that the government should work out a strategy to tackle unemployment within rural communities, as this would reduce the burden of combating crime by law enforcement agencies.

According to him, “We should look at this because it is a problem within our community that needs to be tackled.”

Similarly, the chairman of the Bayelsa State Council of Traditional Rulers, the Amanyanabo of Twon Brass, Alfred Diete-Spiff, said Nigeria started as a British democratic colony, but later discarded that and adopted the American model of federalism.

Diete-Spiff who was the first military governor of Old Rivers State said it behooves on operators of the Nigerian State to follow the American federal system in all its ramifications.

Speaking specifically on community policing, he said: “The police have spelled out what they are doing. Brilliant. But in the final analysis, I pray, there are members of the National Assembly here and other persons, who have the authority to make things happen. Please let’s have state police and county police, and we can franchise the police in the interim to be doing the community policing,” he said.

Diete-Spiff added that the prevailing security challenge in the Niger Delta and the rest of the country makes it imperative for a total overhaul of the country’s security architecture.

“Frankly, we have vigilante groups in our communities, which are run by community leaders. If these people are taken and trained almost like the special constabulary and given ranks, it will go much better than we are talking and talking.”

The retired naval chief said the country must be proactive by restructuring the entire security arrangement in the country, arguing that the Nigerian Navy was supposed to be offshore not inshore.

On ways of addressing incessant cases of piracy on the waterways, he recommended the establishment of the coast guard in the country.

The Obi Efeizomor II Of Owa Kingdom, Emmanuel Efeizomor, who observed that the Nigerian Police is overstretched because the grossly inadequate policemen were battling by themselves to protect the people and maintain law and order in the society. But with community policing, where the people will also be part of those policing themselves, the crime rate would surely plunge.

“If you police yourself and I police myself, crime will eventually come down. So, I think that what we must do as at now is to come up with an Asaba Declaration, where we should be accepting that community policing should be so liberalised so that every part of the Niger Delta can police itself.”

The Chairman, Association of Rural Chiefs for Peace and Development, Bayelsa State Nengi James, said community policing ought to be the initiative of communities, and not that of the Police.

He urged the IGP to understudy the Anambra State model of community policing, where community people are completely in charge.

“The National Assembly and States Houses of Assembly should enact a law on community policing, where traditional rulers will be heads of community policing in their domains and all the agents that are operating within their jurisdiction. You cannot discuss community policing without the community. Policing and police differ. The problem is the policing and not the policeman,” he said.

The Project Manager, Keeping Peace in the Niger Delta, Search for Common Ground, Emeka Cletus, suggested that for community policing to be effective, there must be established local community peace networks.

He added that traditional rulers must also be integrated into the community policing structure for early warning and response, noting that this is what the Nigerian Police need to enhance community policing.

“At the local level, we need what we call a community security architecture dialogue. This is a network of all operating security agencies. One of the problems of community policing is information sharing. If security agencies’ representatives keep building blocks among themselves, not much will be achieved.”

Michael Omomila of the Youth Council of Nigeria, Edo State chapter, said a recent study conducted by the United Nations had revealed that on average, there ought to be one police officer per 333 civilians, but in Nigeria’s case, it is one policeman to thousands of Nigerians due to a shortage of manpower. So, if we have adequate policemen, I think the issue of insecurity will be reduced to its barest minimum. If you look at the various divisional police offices in our local councils, you will discover that they are not enough men to combat crime even within the areas that they are sited,” he said.

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